Heretofore, as cyan inks for ink-jet recording, inks containing cyan dyes such as C. I. Acid Blue 74, C. I. Acid Blue 9, and the like have been known. However, these cyan dyes do not have sufficient light resistance. Therefore, for commercially available cyan inks for ink-jet recording, copper phthalocyanine dyes such as C. I. Direct Blue 86, C. I. Direct Blue 199, and the like are widely used. These typical copper phthalocyanine dyes are superior in the light resistance as compared to magenta dyes and yellow dyes. However, these copper phthalocyanine dyes are prone to be faded or discolored due to contact with ozone. Thus, there is a problem that discoloration or optical density reduction occurs in a recorded object. Therefore, a copper phthalocyanine dye having higher ozone resistance has been proposed.
The conventional cyan inks are required to be superior in the light resistance and the ozone resistance. In addition to that, the conventional cyan inks are required to be superior in color developing properties and not to cause bronzing. However, there were no conventional inks that satisfy all these performances. The bronzing is a phenomenon in which glare (irregular reflection) like metallic luster occurs on a surface of a recording medium such as a glossy paper or the like due to association or aggregation of dyes.